Where is the middle ground in U.S. politics? I think watching televised news is like watching squirrels wrestle over an acorn, except the news is less interesting than actual squirrels would be and the news is much more full of polemic and stilted with agendas and strawmen. In other words an extremely distorted view of reality. (left distorts right and vice versa)
Where do people with middle ground or centrist views gravitate to?
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The problem is that these same people are liars pushing an agenda. They don't care about the truth. I don't believe that they actually believe their own bullshit. Some of them might, but not many. The ones that do are used by the liars to further solidify their own propaganda. They are useful idiots.
Besides, I'm pretty sure that most people on mainstream media and our politicians are just different shades of right wing corporate whores. There is no real left that is spoken of in this context. There are no real left wing voices in prominent roles or on prominent media. When it seems there is someone on the "left" distorting the right's view it's just someone slightly left of that right wing view so it seems like it's left, but the entire spectrum is just moving further right. It's like when people call Democrats "the left". Most of them are moderate to center right leaning corporate whores.
Everyone they really try to silence or attack or enact policies against are really left wing.
It's all right wing corporate private industry authoritarian imperialism. It's just a useful illusion they employ to make it seem otherwise.
Piece2YourPuzzle
Level 8
Mar 28, 2019
3
One of the ways Russia is accused of election meddling is amplifying the voices of both extremes to drown out the middle. By polarizing the discussion between extremes, compromise and sanity go out the window. Only the fanatics vote (due to poor choices coming out of the primaries) and extremests get elected to do extreme things, and non extremists (the majority) don't believe they have representation and lose faith in democracy.
Seems to be working.
1of5
Level 8
Mar 28, 2019
1
I watch Fareed Zakaria on CNN Sundays at noon EST. It's honest, smart, intelligent, and balanced. It is smart people from all over the world conversing, not yelling at each other. PBS is also grown up news and opinion.
Sticks48
Level 9
Mar 28, 2019
1
not all televised news is equal. i prefer news analysis by educated people to talking-head tv news.
i have no idea were centrists gravitate. i have never been a centrist.
g
genessa
Level 8
Mar 27, 2019
0
The powers that be want us divided. It's classic Machiavellian politics. Much easier to keep dry raping a divided and bickering population.
Piratefish
Level 7
Mar 27, 2019
5
This seems odd to me because from a European point of view American politics is all about the middle ground - the Republicans and Democrats both seem very centrist to us.
Jnei
Level 8
Mar 27, 2019
3
JCII:
So Donald Trump appears to you to have been elected and supported by centrists?
It is true that European concepts of "conservative" and "liberal" are historically quite different (and further to the left) than US equivalents. Also until recently most Americans would just give you a blank look if you talked about Social Democrats or Democratic Socialists. To us it is still a novel concept, and most popular with the young and with aging hippies.
One thing we have in common though is corporate infiltration of political agendas and a tendency to favor the privileged / wealthy / powerful disproportionately, even though you don't as often find pretenses to throw the impoverished in prison to get them out of the way as we Americans do.
What you may not realize, though, if you don't follow American politics much, is that we've become very polarized ... the Republicans have split so that traditional (so-called "principled" conservatives) have been sidelined and the party has been completely taken over by right-wing extremists. Similarly the Democratic party is in the midst of a struggle for control between corporate centrists and progressives, some of whom are also extremists, though I'd argue far more rational than their conservative counterparts.
It's not like similar things aren't happening in parts of Europe, of course. Hungary and Poland for example are cases in point where proto-fascist authoritarians are ascendant and pushing highly regressive agendas. Feels weird to be leading the way in that regard, America used to stand for the best in humanity, or at least made a good pretense of it.
Jnei:
@JCII The majority of people who voted for and continue to support Trump would be centrist, yes, albeit it right-of-centre- which is why they voted for a right-of-centre centrist party's candidate. The fact that someone rather more to the right such as him was able to hijack the process illustrates the danger of populism.
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